Farewell to Le Quecumbar!

The only venue in the U.K. -- possibly even the world -- dedicated to Gypsy jazz and the music of Django Reinhardt is no more! 😩

This cafe, nestled away on Battersea High Street was for so many years the centre of such activity in London, and the whole country. Needing an extra cab ride or a car to get to, often on a weekday night, it was always worth the extra effort just to go back in time to a Parisian cafe and hear some joint-jumping hot jazz played there -- sometimes by the best proponents still walking the earth.

Check out the Django Reinhardt 100th Birthday festival put on by Sylvia Rushbrooke, who founded the venue and kept it going as long as she could - which turned out to be 19 years. Quite an achievement!

It was Faebhean Kwest (who I believe is on Hive as Hive account@kwest1) who first got me into this music, and he was already a regular player at Le Que in the noughties when I first went there.

But I didn't start to imagine that I could join in the fun as a player until I picked up the clarinet again in 2017, making my first forays into swing alongside Hive account@steevc as Hive account@swing47, and still later playing with Hive account@purplesinger and Hive account@anna-newkey as part of our street and dance band Swing 42. Somewhere in between all of that, before the pandemic, Faebhean was kind enough to invite me down to Le Que to "sit in" with him on a Friday night a couple of times. Here we are (that's him on the left) playing Nuages, a Django favourite:

I was a bit nervous given where I was playing, but it was such a great atmosphere that I soon relaxed a bit. I have so many happy memories of this place, and this was one of the best ever.

Sylvia recently sent out an email telling people about the issues she had been having with the landlord, forcing her to abandon the venue after regulations in her favour were completely ignored.

Now the dust has settled after the closure and I have had time to gather my thoughts etc - I would like thank all our staff, supporters, musicians and Patrons, over 19 years, all the staff that stayed to the very end, all the musicians who created the amazing music and were the heart of what Le Q was about.

She later told me:

It was a long hard road with some unforgettable memories and I hope to make Samois next year

The system is broken – as we have clear rights – but no one to enforce or to force the landlords to comply – we have to take them to court and this is prohibitive for all but the corporations as usual ..

Sylvia says you can still find all of the music released under the Le Quecumbar record label on Spotify, and she expects to be at the Gypsy Jazz festival at Samois in 2023 next summer.

Here's a taster of what the atmosphere at the Samoreau campsite during the Samois festival (not to be confused with the more commercial Gypsy Jazz Festival in nearby Fontainebleau) can be like. I went a few years ago but the whole trip was a bit spoiled for me by the massive heat wave and 40C temperatures that year. I really hope to get back there soon if it's a bit cooler: